For the years 1978 to 2005, Pope John Paul II was the man of the moment. From his first appearance on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica to his death on the eve of Divine Mercy Sunday, this son of Poland assumed a towering role on the stage of history as the third-longest-reigning servus servorum dei. In the course of his papacy, the Church and the world both were witness to epoch-defining events, radical changes in society and religion, and revolutions in the economic and political orders. In all of this, Pope John Paul II wielded the teaching office of the papacy, preaching and writing prolifically in an effort to clarify and communicate the treasure entrusted by God to the Church: the saving message of Jesus Christ.
Instrumental in this work were his papal letters, of which Selected Encyclicals pre-sents seven: Redemptor hominis, Dives in misericordia, Centesimus annus, Veritatis splendor, Evangelium vitae, Fides et ratio, and Ecclesia de Eucharistia. Solidly representative of his theological vision and pastoral sensibility, Selected Encyclicals of Pope Saint John Paul II echoes the invitation that the Pope himself gave in ref-erence to Pope Leo XIII's Rerum novarum: to return to the texts themselves, en-gaging with and learning from them for the sake of entering more deeply into "the life which is Christ."
